New Jersey tenure charge lawyers Tag Archives

Published on: January 3, 2023

New Jersey Employment Law Decision Examines Arbitrator’s Powers in Principal and Teacher Tenure Hearing Appeals

In many areas of New Jersey employment law, the scope of an arbitrator’s powers is a significant question. This is particularly true in the adjudication of tenure charges against New Jersey teachers and principals. The Appellate Division of New Jersey’s Superior Court squarely addressed this issue in the recently published decision in the case of Sanjuan v. School District of West New York.

The Sanjuan Case: Background

The Court explained that Amada Sanjuan was an assistant principal with the West New York Board of Education, after having been hired as a teacher in 1997. On February 12, 2020, she fell down a flight of stairs. Video of the scene showed that after she fell, she removed a piece of paper from her purse and placed it at the top of the stairs. She pointed out the paper to a custodian and teacher who came to help her and explained that the paper caused her fall. Sanjuan was out of work thereafter, but confirmed this version in a signed injury report.

Published on: February 28, 2021

Court Examines Procedures for Appeals of New Jersey Tenure Arbitration Decisions

by Maurice W. McLaughlin

Under New Jersey employment law, a school board must bring tenure charges when it wants to discipline a tenured teacher. The teacher can then appeal the tenure charges to the New Jersey Commissioner of Education. The Department of Education then refers the case to an arbitrator for determination of whether or not the charges should be sustained. New Jersey’s Appellate Division recently examined the procedures for appealing such a tenure arbitration decision in the case of Ragland v. Board of Education of the City of Newark.

Background

Larhonda Ragland was a tenured teacher in the Newark Public School System. She received consecutive summative evaluations of “ineffective” or “partially ineffective” based on poor student achievement and classroom observations. The Board therefore served her with tenure charges of inefficiency. She challenged the Board’s evaluation process, and the Department of Education the referred the charges to an arbitrator.

Published on: January 27, 2021

Appellate Division Issues New Jersey Employment Law Decision on Applicability of Rice Notice to Tenured Teachers

by Maurice W. McLaughlin

The Appellate Division recently issued an important New Jersey employment law decision concerning the due process rights of tenured teachers.

Tenured teachers have significantly more protections than untenured teachers.

An untenured teacher is essentially an “employee-at-will” who may be terminated without cause; however, an untenured teacher has the right to require that her board of education discuss her termination in public session. Thus, the board cannot discuss an untenured teacher’s employment without first giving the untenured teacher formal notice of the intention to discuss her employment and the opportunity to require that it be held in public; this notice is referred to as a “Rice Notice” and derives from the Open Public Meetings Act.

Published on: June 21, 2018

Appellate Division Rules That Entire Controversy Doctrine Has Limited Applicability to Arbitration of Tenure Charges Under New Jersey’s TEACHNJ Act of 2012

by Maurice W. McLaughlin

chalk-1551566__340-300x225 The Appellate Division of New Jersey’s Superior Court recently addressed a procedural question with significant implications for New Jersey teachers and other teaching staff members fighting tenure charges under the TEACHNJ Act of 2012.

The TEACHNJ Act changed the system for fighting tenure charges. Previously, a teacher or other teaching staff member would have the right to have their appeals heard before an administrative law judge, who would normally have a trial on the merits of the teacher’s objections and defenses. The results would then be sent to the New Jersey Department of Education, which could accept or reject the administrative law judge’s findings. Whatever the outcome, either party could appeal the Department of Education’s decision to the Appellate Division and then to New Jersey’s Supreme Court. Under the TEACHNJ Act, however, the administrative law process was eliminated, and objections to tenure charges are now heard by a single arbitrator in binding arbitration. There are only very limited grounds for appeal.

Recently, a teacher had a series of tenure charges filed against him. He had two separate charges of “inefficiency.” He then had a later tenure charge of “conduct unbecoming” for allegedly inflicting prohibited corporal punishment on a student. He objected that the entire controversy doctrine barred the charges because they occurred before the inefficiency charges were decided and therefore they all should have been brought together.